If you follow me on the instagram you may have seen the image posted above. For those of you who haven’t experienced a birthday with me before I feel like its fair to give you some warning, so here goes. Every year, in the lead up to my birthday I begin a birthday countdown. What’s a birthday countdown you ask? Effectively it’s just a new picture every day to remind everyone that it’s coming. With birthday month swiftly approaching the theme has been set, the photoshoot booked, the hashtag is yet to be decided on. Hopefully you aren’t all birthday grinches and will enjoy it with me! P.s. my birthday wish is to trend or something. Just so you know.

In other areas of goodness (Which by the way are more things that I found and liked than boring ass things I did)?

If you ever wanted to read the intelligent reasonings of an influential person’s voting choices for the upcoming US election then go no further. This distinguished leader of the pride has got you covered.

More seriously, if you don’t know who Cate Bolt is then you should google her. I first came across her on twitter and would describe her as as fiercely passionate and incredibly inspiring women. This post on her son and mental illness is a great read, both a bit heart achey and uplifting at the same time.

Adam and Rebecca have to write blog posts for uni and they’re quite entertaining (think sex, stories from working in a strip club, social media, nude J.Biebs.) Have a read hereand here.

Re the whole aforementioned birthday thing, if you want to buy me a present then this is what I want. To sum it up – James Bond, Champagne, Gadgets.

I’ve mentioned my friend Hala on here before, she writes and performs spoken word poetry. And it’s good, really good. Once a month she puts on a poetry slam night at 1885 with her poetry family. Last time I went and sawthis poemby her sister in poetry, Jahra. It’s called God Bless America and if you read into that as facetiously as I do, then you’ll love it.

Finally, this weeks hashtags to follow would have to be #YNBall, As one twitteruseraptly put it, ‘If you’re not going to #YNBall this saturday, there is either something wrong with you or you’re left wing.’

If you don’t enjoy giggling at political pot shots and prefer a bit of male/ female angst/ a brand being a sexist fuck then you might want to follow this story instead – #momentsofmanhoodor #moa. Pretty much Moa have released an incredibly sexist ‘prospectus (that I’m sure breaches the advertising standards coughcarssexalcoholcough) and are now getting the flack that they rightly deserve. Moa owner, Geoff Ross said that it was no different to Tui etc, but um. Yeah, Tui are super classy too right? There’s a NZ Heraldstory too.

Follow me on twitter @madicattt where I get angsty about issues, buses and other fwp.